Two cars made especially huge positive impression during 2021 … and one kinda cratered.

HOW many ‘car of the year’ awards can a country stand?

Simple answer: Just the one. That’s the national award meted annually by the NZ Motoring Writers’ Guild (the representative body for the majority of car commentators) for more than three decades now. It’ll be announced in February, a delay caused by Covid-19.

Some publications have chosen to steer into that hallowed territory, one to the point of all but hijacking the national title. That’s not MotoringNZ’s style.

However, that doesn’t mean it cannot answer the two questions often asked at this time of year: Those being - ‘what’s the best car you’ve driven’ and, quite often, ‘what’s the worst?’

Many publications tend to avoid from answering the second, conceivably for fear of losing support from the brand in the spotlight. Not here.

However, I would nonetheless suggest ‘best’ and ‘worst’ and pretty harsh judgements. Truly poor cars are rare to find these days and, to be fair, nothing deserving the doghouse came to this address during the past 12 months.

However, there’s no doubt that some convinced much more powerfully than others.

The most convincing car of 2021 was …

Hyundai Ioniq 5

BIG news this week that slipped quietly by was that Hyundai has become the latest maker to abandon the development of future internal combustion engines to focus on electric cars.

The make’s new research and development boss, Chung-Kook Park, apparently broke the news in an email with comment that “it is inevitable to convert into electrification. Our own engine development is a great achievement, but we must change the system to create future innovation based on the great asset from the past.”

This doesn’t mean that every Hyundai here now will suddenly disappear, or convert to mains power allegiance. But it assuredly means that all those ICE models we’re familiar with will, in future form, with continue with the powertrains we know already or will dump them for electric alternates. The probability of the latter scenario being the case is high. The electric age is unavoidable.

With that in mind, we need cars that deliver something special. If future fare from Huyundai continues to be of the calibre exhibited by the Ioniq 5, then this make is well sorted for the challenges and excitements ahead. I’m of the mind this car, alone, could yet one day be viewed as a landmark of the same level of importance to its maker as the Beetle was to Volkswagen.

No argument, if any version was going to impress, it had to be the specification tested; the Limited has everything. Except, perhaps, best value appeal. At $112,000 as driven, it was the equivalent of a platinum-plus ticket experience; with a $30,000 premium over the Government EV rebate-eligible base edition more Kiwis are interested in.

Still, what redeems is that you don’t have to spend the most to achieve the best elements – the intriguing design, advanced tech (including that NZ-first vehicle-to-load capability), practical range, sense of ‘dare to be different’ cool and impressive build quality - spread across the entire range. All that, and knowing that it has a brilliant support network, with properly national sales and servicing, makes it a winner.

I’m happy to admit that this was one of the cars I was most looking forward to experiencing in 2021 and would say, too, that it was among a relative few I was genuinely sad to say goodbye to.

The other was also electric, being the Audi RS e-tron GT; the stupendous $282k sticker kept it from achieving pole position in this exercise, but had everything been judged on money-no-object technology terms then Ingolstadt’s version of the Porsche Taycan in spirit, more than in engineering (you’d be surprised how little beyond the basic platform is shared), would have raced away. It’s undoubtedly a controversial car that’ll rile some RS faithful – it certainly sent a fellow motoring commentator who has the wherewithall to enjoy the badge into a sulk, though he really missed the point: RS life with stonk and no snarl is the way forward. And its unaffordability for many doesn’t diminish the relevance. So, it’s another car really worth celebrating.

The least convincing car of 2021 was …

BMW M8

I’VE nothing against M cars. I’d give anything to own an M3. I also readily agree that the M8 is befitting the badge. In pure engineering terms and when measured against any stopwatch, or noise-meter, it’s awesome with a capital ‘A’.

Yet this massive two-door is surely now an anachronism; though the unavoidable transition away from fossil fuels to electric and hydrogen has triggered a rush to deliver ‘last-ever’ outrageous petrol-addicted toys (it’s as if there’s no tomorrow, because there really isn’t) the most expensive last-chance setting for the petrol-fed twin turbo 4.4-litre V8 is one of those cars chasing pole position for a race that’s already been run.

Being a brilliantly-engineered ego polisher is no bad thing per se and par for the course. But you still have to be on trend; in that respect, it’s Status Quo playing to a crowd ignorant of heavy metal.

The huge thirst for a dwindling hydrocarbon resource, being an over-large car with an almost laughably under-sized cabin (and boot) sitting so low as to be awkward to egress; reminding just how double-sided the term ‘autobahn express’ is in an environment devoid of straight, unrestricted driving – all that threatens to make it a plump target for proletariat scorn. You might be able to live with all that.

What surely must be hard for even the ultra-rich to take, though, is the potential for hugely savage depreciation. When I asked a person who is the business to know what a car with a $332,900 ‘as new’ price tag and with just over 5000kms’ on the clock might fetch if it were traded, the answer simply sickened … and reinforced thought that, now we’re entering a period when it might seem more sensible to drive an upmarket electric for the week and reserve a hot petrol car for weekend fun, that money would be better spent on a high-spec iX plus an M3 or M4.